Heaven on Earth!

Nea Kameni Volcano

I’ve died and gone to heaven! Santorini is everything that I had hoped for and more. I also think I picked the very best spot on the entire island. Maybe not the fanciest hotel, but so rustic and very charming. The staff is wonderful and made me feel right at home. Oh by the way, I didn’t have to pay extra money for my suitcase this trip! Bonus! I had a great little flight over here. Mostly English speaking people on my plane. I met my first friend. Charlie.(Charlene) She is Egyptian and comes from Sydney but lives in London. She is a delightful girl (27 years old) and wants to hang out with me on the island. In fact the next three islands we are going to, are the same. It is just I am going to one and she is going to the other. I guess we could switch plans but I kind of like the independent thing. Now who would have thought that is what I would want two weeks ago?

I arrived late in the evening and the sun had just set.

The manager took this picture of me drinking my coffee. See why I think it is heaven. Can you imagine anything more beautiful. (Not me! The scenery!)

I got up this morning to discover that they don’t start serving breakfast until 8:30. Now it is not possible to run around here. If you like doing stairs then that would definitely be an option. There is nothing but stairs. It was so funny watching me try and struggle down the narrow, (I mean narrow) stair cases to get to my hotel. I have taken some pictures of the stairs but you can just imagine me and my big knapsack and 80 pound suitcase maneuvering the stairs. If the cab driver was a gentleman he would have offered. The hotel had sent someone to pick me up but he was not there when I got off the planed so I hitched a cab. It was quite the ride as his name was Adamas and he wanted to show me the island. No thank you!

I was shown to my room and it is so tiny and quaint.

Biker chick! Love the helmet!

I decided to be wild and rented a quad to go visit all the sites. I thought about a car, and you can drive a car anytime, but not a quad. So on I hop and off I go. Where? I have no idea. I first headed to the main town of Fira. This is where a lot of people stay. I wouldn’t. It is full of people and the traffic is horrific for a small village. Apparently you have to spend a day there to see the shops and museums. I continued on my way and ended up in a very tiny village of Messaria.

I have already eaten half the bread and half the tzatziki. Now for my Eva salad.

The yogurt here is fantastic. I know I have tried to tell you this before, but compared to ours at home they are two different things. Ours is so gelatinous. It is thin and flavourless. This stuff is so thick and creamy. I poured honey on it this morning to show you what it looks like. It is yummy!  They make the tzatziki with the yogurt just in case you didn’t know (but I know you did).

5 minues later!

Continued on my way through the center of the island. (You can still see water for the most part) Santorini is a very small island and I think you could drive the entire perimeter in a day. Now I was really starting to worry about my arms in the sun, so I decided to head home and take a break from the sun for the afternoon. My back is flaming hot but what is really killing me is my butt. I guess the famous bikini rode up a bit and exposed skin that never got the sunscreen (or I just rubbed it off faster). Either way it hurts to sit down today. But don’t worry about me, I am sitting here drinking red wine and entering this journal entry (picture enclosed). Life is very GOOD!

My friend Charlene is going to the volcano today and I wanted to do the quad thing so we shall see if we actually ever meet up.

See the computer! See the red wine! This is where I spent my afternoon to stay out of the sun.

There are lots of English speaking people on the island. Not the Greeks, but tourists. So I guess this is a major destination for us. This is more how I thought all of Greece was going to be but instead I have had two weeks of virtually no English.

Tomorrow I may go on a wine tour. I guess they still stomp the grapes with their feet in Santorini but since the grapes are not ready I won’t be able to see that. Darn! That would have been wonderful.

I do want to go to the volcano.

Looking through the front door of my room. My bed is on bricks and so it the head board.

So I have lots to do and if I want to stay longer I will. I hope I can change my ferry ticket without a problem. That would be a bummer if I had to leave because of that.

Now I am going to load the pictures, but I can promise you that they will not do any justice to what I see. It is spectacular! I can’t find the words to describe it.